Monday, June 26, 2006

If you know me, you'll know committing that question to any form of readable stuff is quite a step forwards. I've been debating the issue again with myself on and off for the last few weeks, running around like the proverbial rat in a maze down the usual blind alleys labelled "self-loathing", "mortality", "loss of self", "economics" etc etc.

And I still have the feeling I don't have enough information to make the decision. I'm a terrible decision maker anyway, and barring infanticide (which is a little messy once the authorities know you've got one) there's no real way to reverse your decision once it's been made.

I've always been dead set against having kids, mainly due to the usual middle-class vices of having free time to think and hobbies. If you think about stuff enough you never do it: fear is the mind-killer.

But, predictably as the sun rising and setting, I've come to wonder what the hell I'm doing anything for: if all it's for is getting a couple of strands of molecules to make it into another protoplasmic carrier for 4 score and 10, it all seems pretty bloody pointless.

I wish there was someone I thought could tell me something about this which would help... there isn't, is there?

So I'll do the trad british thing and muddle through, I guess. I bet most kids are accidental...

If anyone's listening out there in information blizzardsville, let me know if you made the decision and did it, and why.

Thursday, June 22, 2006

I should start writing crosswords... the post title could correspond to the gigs at o'neills, or the weather, which is much more like the June we know and love. Pre-summer, as I used to call it: not as still as July/Aug/Sept (and, in the SE here, October) but one hell of a lot warmer than April.

I just got the new Chilis album. 28 tracks of gold dust, I love the simplicity of the tracks, the way the arrangements leave me to fill in spaces, the lack of huge instrumentation: it's so good to see a band with the confidence to trust their songs and not fall into overkill. The lushest RHCP album has to be "One Hot Minute", mainly down to the influence of Dave Navarro, who filled in the guitar for that album. It's a great album, but shows that the 4 piece we have now has a solidarity about them which produces some of the best music I've heard in a long time. There's contrast here - it's not all introspection - there's trademark funk, and you can hear more of John F's influence coming in. In particular, the harmony vocals are startlingly good on this album, doing a great job of filling out spaces where lesser bands would have dug into a synth pad or something.

Everything is mixed so wonderfully dry, it reminds me of beaches somehow.

Now, more metaphysically - I recalled recently a line from "The Princess Bride" (indulge me) - "Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something." - is our pace, our consumerism, all of it, destined only to crush us....?

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

How resilient are you? Do you have a depth you need to sink to before you rise up again? I saw a woman this morning on (gasp splutter) GMTV who was "an alcoholic". Well, she was actually bright, well spoken and had exactly the right opinion of why she drank, and it wasn't like she was in the gutter:

bluntly, she was alone, and scared. Said she's always been scared, and booze dulled fear of stuff so she could cope.

Doctor Hilary (sic) then piped up with medical addicition mumbo-jumbo, totally missing the point. How many alcoholics out there are drinking to dull fear, pain, anxiety, job worries, marraige worries, lack of self esteem?

Modern life+booze equals the UK boozer phenomenon.

But try hearing that on TV. Nobody ever puts the who puzzle together, least of all our MPs.

How many bars are there in the westminster asylum for the terminally egotistical anyway?

Saturday, June 10, 2006

Good gig last thursday, but I'm well under par at the moment. Far too many unforced errors and stumbled pickings-I'm exhausted, not getting any sleep, but with any luck things will change after the 16th when I see the sleep docs at Churchills Hosp in Oxford. I'll get a neat machine to strap to my face and fall asleep having air pumped into my nose. Hopefully then I can get some sleep.

I never thought I'd have what is essentially a genetic defect: this OSA is partly due to the shape of my throat and mouth. Feels a bit odd to wander through life for 30 odd years with no real problems and then face up to being built wrong. Sort of like facing mortality, in a way.

Should I be grasping for wanting kids at this point?

I do know there are people who start families because they've run out of things to do. That sounds like the worst reason to have kids to me! Are most families the result of burnout, early onset middle age crises, burst condoms and tequila binges? That's a sad society if so...

I need to write some lyrics. It's all in there waiting to get out. Catharsis is good for you.

Friday, June 02, 2006

Yep, another great night last night. Was "supposed to be" tonight but Jay got confused :) at one point after the first set someone approached Jamie for his number (a guy, I might add - arf arf!) saying he was Robbie W's drummer and he was "always looking for good support acts" - yeah right!

Good crowd last night, they always sing along really loudly to the crowd pleasers that Jay stokes 'em up with ;)

I'm thinking of getting some flightcases with half decent wheels on for the stack, to protect the bits in (smelly) transit (so to speak). Jamie says he'd really like to case up the Marshall head... I suspect Rich would like his amp cased too, I've got it at home to look at like I did Jay's the other week, the knobs are all well shagged and the preamp doesn't work too well - he generally plugs a guitar POD into the poweramp input on the back (which sounds good!)...

Trouble is, if I flightcase the Warwick cabs, they won't fit in the car any more. D'oh!